Yes, Sir
by cellotlix
Summary: After the Cerberus Coup, Kaidan pulls rank.


**AN: Another tumblr plot bunny, though this one I only have to blame on myself. What can I say- this smut business is kind of fun. :3 I hope you enjoy!**

Shepard has become intimately familiar with the smell of death, with the cadences of war. And as far as wars went, this is a long one, and as brutal as she'd even known. Yet, there is something different about seeing the devastation of the Citadel after the Cerberus coup attempt. It is strange. Foreign. Even the Citadel can be breached, and the galaxy knows it now.

She feels like screws are being pressed slowly in her temple and her eyelid spasms – a constant twitching, now. She's buried two of her closest friends in the last two days. No, not friends. More than that. She's buried two members of her family, which dwindles by the day. She feels as if she's been scraped clean from the inside, hollowed by grief that goes beyond tears or words.

If it was only that. Hours earlier, she aimed a pistol at the forehead of the man she once believed she loved more than anything in the world. Her hands shook over the barrel of the gun as she begged for him to just listen to her, dammit; for him to just think about the situation without seeing shadows where there were none. For him to just obey for once.

It's different, now. She's barely a Commander, he's a Major. There is a chasm of hurt between them and she doesn't know how to cross it. She doesn't know if she wants to anymore. She's tired of being questioned and doubted. She's fucking sick of her loyalties and motivations being second-guessed by someone who is supposed to believe her.

Who knows where Kaidan is right now. She tries to convince herself she doesn't care.

Shepard presses the heels of her hands into her eyes so hard that she sees whirling geometric patterns dance behind her eyelids. She's so tired, and so, so fucking angry. She punches into the code to the Normandy airlock while trying not to think or process anything at all.

She almost stumbles when she sees who is waiting for her.

It's Kaidan, of course. His arms are crossed over his chest – her eyes automatically drift to the banding muscles in his arms and chest, so lean and well-formed, and a wave of desire clenches in her gut. She hates herself for this visceral reaction to him, though it should be expected at this point. Before Lazarus, they couldn't keep their hands off each other. Before her death, they were joined in whatever way they could manage.

"Major," she says stiffly. "How can I help you?"

"I wanted to talk to you," he says after a moment. He doesn't acknowledge her formality or obvious belligerence. He fixes her with a stare that roots her to the ground and nearly knocks her feet out from under her.

"So talk," she said, waving a dismissive hand. "Fair warning, though; I've had just about enough of listening to you."

He's stunned and a little angry at this. "Right. I – I wanted to talk about what happened today."

"I don't know what there is to talk about, Major," she said sharply. "You and I; we said we'd try and start again, remember? I guess I'm not sure how that'll be possible if you can't learn to take me at my word."

He understands, now. His brows pull low, a wrinkle forming in the center – that same wrinkle she used to kiss when he worried without need. She's so angry at him, but she needs to touch him just the same and the resonance between anger and need makes her already throbbing skull ache even worse.

"I'm not going to apologize for being cautious, Shepard," he says to her, his arms tightening over his chest. "Not with the lives of the Council on the line."

"So principled," she snarls. "Do they keep you warm at night, Major?"

"Stop that," he warns, eyes dangerous.

"No," she fires back. "You challenge my choices, you resist the things I say, you refuse to see that I am not and have never been a terrorist and a threat to the Council, even now after all that I have done! And now you're looking at me like I'm being irrational by being so pissed at you I could -"

"You could what?" he demands.

"Forget it. Leave me alone."

"Stop, Commander," he snaps. It's nothing like the way he said it before – respect and deference and a bit of worship mingled in his husky voice, a sound she'd come to love and expect. It's hard and angry; it's a command. She slowly turns to face him, not bothering to mask her outrage. This is a betrayal.

"Yes, sir," she says, and her voice is dripping with hate.

"You're angry. You feel like I've violated some unspoken agreement between us, and maybe I have. If you were Shepard, though, you would understand that this isn't personal; it's business. It's duty."

She isn't aware of breathing. "_If?" _she whispers, shaking with rage. "_If?!" _

He's realized his mistake a half-second too late, and if she wasn't so angry the swift regret spilling over his beautiful features would stop her in her tracks, but she's been pushed well past the point of control. She's lost family, she's killed allies, she's so exhausted she wants to die, and on top of it all, Kaidan is still looking at her like a monster rather than a woman, and she wants to hurt him.

She slaps him so hard that she hears his neck crack as his head his whips to the side. She hates that she slapped him; a slap is so weak – prissy almost—and it would have felt better to punch the daylights out of him. Oh, yes; this is insubordination of the worst kind. He could haul her ass over the coals and have her court-marshaled for daring to strike a superior officer before she had time to blink.

He holds a hand to his face, his cheek already an angry red. He's looking at her – stunned and angry and something else, something she's forgotten.

"Careful, Commander," he warns.

"Or what? You going to haul my ass in? Court-marshal me? Drag me through another tribunal?"

"No," he says. "I will ask you to explain yourself."

"This was supposed to be over!" she yells at him. "We were supposed to be past this! I thought I had proved to you again and again that I _am _Shepard, just like you remember, and that I am _not Cerberus. _But you still don't believe me! Today you pointed a gun at my head. You would have splattered my brains on the walls if I hadn't had hard evidence proving that Udina was the traitor, not me. And I'm supposed to sit here and listen to you explain it all away, snap my heels and pop a salute, yes sir, yes sir, like a sycophant. Right?"

He takes a step closer, his hand dropping from his cheek. "No," he says. He's angry, and it strikes her that she's never seen him this angry before. He's almost always perfectly controlled – pulled tight and neat, a walking set of hospital corners with gorgeous eyes and a body made for want. She hates him because she doesn't.

"Permission to resume my duties, Major?" she hurls at him, making her words sharp like knives because the longer she looks at him, the harder it is to stay angry.

"Denied." He's too close. She sees him reaching for her and she evades his grasp because she knows fully well what will happen. The minute he touches her – from anger or desire – she'll buckle under him, she'll obey his orders. She doesn't want to.

She may not be the superior here on land, but she sure as hell is on the Normandy. She dodges him and punches the code to the inner airlock, but he follows her, leaping onboard just as the decontamination procedure begins.

"I don't remember giving you permission to board my ship," she snarls, hardly audible over the hissing of the airlock.

"Dammit, Shepard. I wasn't going to apologize for being cautious, but I was going to apologize for – for doubting you," he admits angrily.

"And now?"

He realizes that he's close, that only a few small inches separate them, and that it's been years since they've touched each other in the way they both desperately want. She watches him war for control, and there is a small part of her that knows victory when she sees him lose that battle.

He captures her jaw in one strong hand, angling her face towards his. She bunches his shirt in her fist unconsciously, torn between anger and need as she watches him suspended by the same. When he crushes his mouth to hers, she obeys. _Yes, sir._

She can't breathe from the intensity of his kiss, and it strikes her that it's been almost three years since they've done this, since they've touched lips to lips, since she's felt him press against her – tautly muscled, his erection pressing between her thighs. He slams her against the airlock so hard that the breath is knocked out of her and she can't breathe, she can't-

She shoves him away out of reflex, gasping for air. For a moment, she wasn't kissing Kaidan; she was twisting in the darkness of the void, sucking down nothing, choking on the vacuum. For a moment, she was dying again. "D-don't-"she chokes.

For a moment, he misunderstands. He thinks she's talking about kissing. He draws away before slow recognition dawns when he sees her brief terror, her gasping for air. They're angry and aroused, but there is still enough left of what they shared before for him to almost immediately know her fear.

This time when he kisses her, he is conscious if not quite careful. His hands are desperate as they run over her body, cupping her breasts. His mouth is everywhere at once, hard and demanding, and she has to obey—she _wants _to obey; _yes, sir. _He activates his Omni-tool and overloads the airlock door so that they are alone, so that they will not be disturbed, not until they want to be. And they don't.

How easily anger betrays her to desire! Not that it disappears, not exactly; when he crushes his lips to hers she bites his lip so hard that she tastes his blood, warm and coppery on her tongue. Her hands push under his shirt, and her nails break skin when her fingers rake up the length of his back. He responds – not quite in kind, but close; he rips the buckle on her pants as he forces them down and grabs her hips so roughly that she knows she'll find bruises the next day, exactly the shape of his hands.

She had a lot of time to think about what this would be like – the first time they'd make love after her resurrection. She'd fantasize when she was alone in her cabin, tossing and turning, unable to sleep. Her fingers would wander lower until she would find a ghost of the pleasure she knew at his hands, his name on her lips. She imagined it'd be like it was before – tender and passionate.

But this is furious; as rough as the word 'fuck' implies. He brings every day of grief and frustrated desire to bear, unleashing it at her without mercy, and if she were a lesser woman she would break under the strength of it. She would drown. But she is not; she meets him with strength and passion she wasn't sure she still possessed. Her exhaustion and grief is a dim memory now.

Right now, she just wants him.

She fumbles with his pants but he grabs her wrists roughly, holding them so tightly she wonders if he'll break them. "Shepard," he growls under his breath; his hot breath on her neck sends shivers running up her spine, and she curls into him.

"Yes," she breathes. _Yes, sir._

Kaidan spins her around and presses her against the bulkhead, pinning her wrists overhead with one hand. She feels his thick erection press against her buttocks, and this makes her ache for him so badly that she unconsciously grinds into him, moving her hips in a slow circle. He groans roughly, and the sound is all sex, all desire; with a trace of that sorrow that has sharpened him over the years.

When he plunges into her she can't keep from crying out. Her attempts to muffle herself against the bulkhead are in vain; she dimly knows that the whole Citadel could probably hear her pitiful moaning as he thrusts into her. He's trying to keep his rhythm deliberate but she feels him quickly losing control. His releases her wrists and cups her breasts from behind so tightly that it would hurt in any other place, with any other man. But now she wants him to drill deeper, to plunder and take and demand, so that she can obey – _yes, sir._

"Oh god, Shepard," he moans, pressing his face against the back of her neck, his teeth grazing her shoulder, marking skin, claiming as his own. It's almost too fast to be savored; he brings her up and over too much, too quickly – god - and she cries out, shuddering around him as he increases his pace. He needed this – he saved this for her for three years and she would be monstrous if she denied him, if she didn't allow him to take what he needed, now on the precipice of his failing control. Her fingers scrabble against the bulkhead and when he comes, she's right there with him, obedient to the end.

* * *

When they finally repair the airlock door, Shepard and Kaidan are standing side by side, buttoned up and tucked tight, totally silent. Shepard studiously ignores the knowing look on Joker's face and turns to Kaidan when they're well out of earshot.

It's strange between them. She's not angry anymore; rather, she feels wrung out like a sponge, stimulated beyond her ability to process. He's looking much the same, but something has changed in that furious moment in the airlock. Maybe now he knows. Maybe now it'll be different.

"Permission to rejoin the Normandy, Commander?" he asks her. It's a swift return to their former roles, and that is what strikes her as tender and hopeful. That is what gives her the promise that things may once again be as they were.

"Permission granted," she tells him.

"Yes, ma'am."


End file.
